In order to grind a planar face of revolution of a workpiece, it is standard to rotate the workpiece while engaging it against a rotating grinding disk. In straight plunge-cut grinding of end faces, only a relatively small area of the abrasive workpiece comes into contact with the workpiece. This results in irregular wear in the edge area of the grinding wheel, which must also be corrected by machining a relatively large amount of material off the grinding wheel when dressing it.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,530,882 discloses a method of machining side faces of crankshaft bearings in the contact face between the grinding wheel and the workpiece is enlarged by a zigzag-shaped plunge-cut movement and wear is optimized.